Indian names: Encyclopedia II - Indian names - South Indian names

Indian names - South Indian names

South Indians, for long time, had a simple naming system. Historically, everyone was called by a single name, which was chosen in one of three ways that South Indians chose their names:

• The name of their Village / Town e.g. Delhi Ganesh
• Their Family name e.g. Pulithevar
• Some used both e.g. Madurai Mani Iyer

The concepts of initials, middle names, family names and surnames is foreign to South Indians. Everyone had a single name like Murugesh or Lakshmanan. Occasionally these names were extremely lengthy, like Murugesa Lakshmanan. A lengthy name could be interpreted as a sign of affection on behalf of one's parents. However it did not assert the full name of that particular family nor did it gave more information as such about that family.

Under British rule, Indians were expected to follow English procedures for official purposes like registering births, enrolling children in school and registering land ownership details.

Many South Indians, especially Tamils, use the name of their hometown as the family name. In this case the surname is placed before the given name. Some have both a village name and a caste name as part of their name, for instance Madurai Mani Iyer. Here, Madurai is a town and Iyer is a caste. Many Keralites especially Syrian Christians use as their last name the "tharavaad" -- a description of their ancestral home. Names like Pramod Perumparambil and Paul Chemmanoor fall under this category.

In southern India, especially in Tamil Nadu and Kerala where caste symbols tend to be kept private, there is widespread usage of a patronymic: use of the father's given name as the second name. This means that the given name of one generation becomes the second name of the next. In many usages, this second name is used as an initial and the given name may appear like a second name. For example a name like "Ajith Abraham" means "Ajith son of Abraham". If Ajith then has a son named Ashwin, then his name would be Ashwin Ajith.

It is common for women to adopt their husband’s first name as their own surname. Sunitha Gopalan (Sunitha daughter of Gopalan) might change her name to Sunitha Rajiv (Sunitha wife of Rajiv) after marriage. Some South Indians use an inverted patronym as their last names. For example, Chitra Visweswaran is a dancer whose last name is either a patronym or the given name of her husband. More common among women, the inverted patronym is also adopted by people migrating West who want to be called by their given names without having to explain Indian naming conventions. Their last names are then the given names of their fathers or husbands.

Among Christians in Kerala, it is a common practice to have a middle name which is the baptismal name, usually the first name of a grandparent or godparent, like Roshni Mary George and Anoop Antony Philip. Till about two decades ago, some people were named in the 'Family name-Given name-Caste' format. Eg Kannoth Karunakaran Maarar, interpreted as Karunakaran of the Maarar caste from the Kannoth family.

The pressure of conformity and Westernization is especially strong for overseas Indians, often forces them to acquire surnames, either by inventing one, splitting their given name, or adopting their patronyms as family names. In North India, the first name is often split to generate a last name. "Arunkumar" can be split into "Arun Kumar". This is also common among Muslims with two names, like Abdul Kalam, the President of India.

Indian names - Initials

In Western societies, when there are two people with the same name, for example, Robert Jones and Robert Smith, in a class, they are refered to as Robert J. and Robert S. respectively to avoid confusion. But, two Ramans in South India do not have different surnames, since Raman is their only name. So the names of their fathers is used as an initial instead of a surname, meaning Raman son of Gopal would be called G.Raman and Raman Son of Dinesh would be called D.Raman. This led to the initial system, mostly followed in South India. Adding an initial before the name is something of a social obligation. Most schools automatically add the initials upon enrollment. In certain societies, a person without an initial (and therefore presumed illegitimate) is looked down upon. An initial is also compulsory for government records. A missing initial in certificates, bank transactions etc. is sometimes considered illegal and may cause inconvenience.

Family names are closely tied to the caste system in India. In some parts of South India, traditional family names have recently been abandoned in favor of a father's/husband's first name as a family name. The use of a father's/husband's first name as a family name eliminates one's caste identity. These family names are also used as initials. School and college records would have the names with initials as given below. "S. Janaki" - the family name initial and then the given name. "S. Janaki" is also written as "Janaki Sridar" in legal documents.

Legal documents such as passports will have the last name fully expanded, instead of initials. Other legal documents such as property deeds will have any of these name formats with the mention of father’s /grandfather’s/husband’s name and/or village/town/city name.

Men's names are usually prefixed with initials as mentioned before. Some men used to omit the initial, adding the father's name in the end. However, this isn't a legal name and won't change their name in official records. For example, both P. Chidambaram and Chidambaram Palaniyappan are valid; however the latter form is not legally used. Generally, the initials are omitted, and father's name is suffixed in order to shorten a name, for example, G. Raja Ravi Varma, son of M. Gopal Krishnan becomes Raja Gopal.

For women, the system of initials is slightly different. Before marriage, a girl uses her father's initial, but after marriage, she uses her husband's initial. Of late the trend has changed and many women, especially those employed, do not change the initials, but continue with their father's initials. This mainly for convenience’s sake, since usually a women's school degrees and career papers have her father's initials on them. Legally changing a name is a cumbersome procedure, including announcing the proposed change in a newspaper and then getting that published in official gazette. So the modern trend is to add the husband's name in the end, like some Western women who add their husband’s name with a hyphen.

People who don't understand the South Indian naming protocol, sometimes expand the initials in an incorrect manner. For example, the name P. Chidambaram, tends to be expanded to Palaniyappan Chidambaram, which is incorrect in the sense that it implies that the person's first name is "Palaniyappan," and the last name or the family name is "Chidambaram." As shown above, this is wrong, since the person's only name is "Chidambaram," with an initial of "P." Other such famous misrepresentations include the chess grandmaster, V. Anand (wrongly expanded as Vishwanathan Anand) and the freedom fighter and statesman, C. Rajagopalachari (often cited as Charkaravarty Rajagopalachari).

Indian names - Surnames or Family Names

Many South Indians also use a family name.

Last names are not common among the Tamil people, but most of the rest of India uses a family name.

1. Invented Family Names such as that of Jawaharlal Nehru and Rajesh Pilot.
2. The Anglo last name of Anglo-Indians -- descendants of British and Indian parents.
3. Portugese-Goan last names like Fernandes.
4. Syrian-Christian last names like Verghese are actually Malayali renderings of the Hebrew/Greek originals (eg. Verghese is George). Since these would be first names of some forefather several generations back, we could call these last names. They do not change from generation to generation and are family-specific.
5. Third or later generation expatriate Indians and others who now have last names that were the given names of one of their ancestors or have intermarried enough to ensure that the last names are not caste/religion names in disguise.

Many Tamils use a "vilasam". That gives the initials (a syllable in Tamil) of the person's paternal ancestors up to, say, 7 generations. This keeps every one readily identifiable. For example, in a reasonably-sized community Mu.Ko.Ka.Mu.Tha.Er. Ganesh would be the cousin of Mu.Ko.Ka.Mu.Tha.Ka. Ganesh.

Nowadays, the complete "vilasam" is used only on important occasions -- more commonly, only the first initial (father's) is used. Caste names are rarely used, since they are not unique.

Father's first name will be the family name (or the last name) of a person in some tamil communities.

Most Telugus conventionally have family name or last name, followed by a given name or first name and then a caste name. Example: Nara Chandrababu Naidu. Nara is the family name, Chandrababu is the given name and Naidu indicates a caste name in modern days world but infact it is a title awarded by emperors to that clan at point in time in history. Naidu from northern Andhra Pradesh may be from Kamma caste and Naidu from southern part of the same state may be from Kapu caste. The correct form of address would be Mr. Naidu (Naidu garu) or Mr. Chandrababu Naidu and not Mr. Nara. Family name + caste indicator/title maybe most likely unique but not guaranteed. A clan is identified by its family name, i.e Nara. So all three names or parts of the name have their function in this case.

In today's complicated Telugu naming world a person who has title "Rao" can be from any caste.

Ex: P.V. Narasimha Rao ex-Indian Prime Minister is a Brahmin by caste and Jalagam Vengal Rao ex-Chief Minister of Andhra Prdesh is a Velama by caste.

These days it has become a fashion rather than convention to use title. Not always a person is named along with the title of clan.

Ex: Raghunadh(First name) Polavarapu(Family name)

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "South Indian names", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki